The Lessons of History

⁵Toynbee, Arnold. A Study of History, Vol. 1: Abridgement of Volumes I-VI; Vol 2: Abridgement of Volumes VII-X. New York: Oxford University Press, 1946 (Vol. 1, renewed in 1974) and 1957 (Vol 2, renewed in 1985).

LEADERSHIP AS KEY TO A SOCIETY'S MORAL ORDER

Leaders, not social designs, shape the moral-social order

Modern writers of American civics textbooks typically present the general character and specific features of a social order, or in our case the American social-political order, as the product of a vast amount of legal engineering. The social order is presented as the sum total of well-designed legal structures, laws, political offices, civil and social institutions, that direct the behavior of the members of a society. In other words, it is good laws and good political structuring that make the good society. It is all very mechanical, all very personality-neutral in its operation.

Understanding social dynamics from this viewpoint, it becomes imperative for those involved in social engineering (social-political reformers found in public office, in academia, in the press, even in the field of entertainment, etc.) to lay out on paper and in their public proposals the blueprints for a truly great society, one whose political offices are designed to work along highly rational lines.

We saw how the social commentator John Locke, for instance, was invited in the 1600s to set out a rational social-governmental plan by which to direct the development of the new Carolina colony. But so perfect was it in design that it was quite useless in dealing with the messy circumstances which this new society faced in actually getting up and running. Then also, we saw how the highly academic President Wilson had precise plans for democratizing global society – which tragically fell apart in the face of political reality. More recently, President Johnson and his advisors had beautiful plans and programs to bring America to perfection as the "Great Society," all of which crumbled in the face of unanticipated social dynamics. And then there was the American effort to rebuild a war-torn Afghanistan and a post-Saddam Iraq through implementing constitutional reform.

Beautiful social plans did not automatically make for beautiful social results. But this is a hard reality almost impossible to get the world of intellectual and bureaucratic social planners to understand.

Thus unfortunately, Americans have been taught that "the office makes the man." Political office supposedly empowers, directs and limits the behavior of anyone filling that office. If the office is well-designed, then anyone holding that office and operating under its directives should fulfill quite nicely the responsibilities society has conferred on him or her.

That principle perhaps holds true at the lower, more bureaucratic level, of the social order (whether a nation, a corporation, a military organization, a university, etc.). But it is not bureaucrats that inspire or direct the behavior of larger society.

Indeed, as has been very clear from the American example itself, societies are actually highly leader-dependent in who or what they happen to be. Sadly, Americans – so enraptured with the rather mechanical idea (even ideal) of legal-mechanical constitutional-democracy – find it almost impossible to acknowledge the key role that individual leaders play in the successes (and failures) of societies. Tragically, Americans love to overthrow authoritarian leaders in the name of promoting their ideal of legal-mechanical constitutional-democracy – then always shocked and confused to see how, instead, their efforts to do so typically throw a society into violent social disarray.

But to anyone who has looked seriously at how human history has worked over the countless generations of human life on this planet, it is always very clear how a single individual can shape the character and operation of society.

History is full of such examples. Chinese history, for instance, is really the study of personal dynasties, ones that have arisen out of a period of confusion when the Chinese society is torn apart by warring warlords, until one of these warlords is able to establish ascendancy over the others, and thus begin a new dynasty, and a new period of peace and social development.

The Hebrew Bible is really a story of ancient Hebrew patriarchs and prophets, Abraham, Moses, Joshua, David, Nathan, Elijah, Elisha, and the huge impact they personally had on the shaping of the Hebrew nation.

Western history is filled with the stories of how such individuals as Alexander the Great, Julius Caesar, Constantine, Charlemagne, Luther, Calvin, Louis XIV, Napoleon, etc., had a huge impact on the defining of the social order of their days.

More recently we have also seen how Hitler, Stalin, Gandhi, Churchill, Mao shaped our world (in ways good or bad) in their days.

And certainly in American history, note the enormous impact that Washington, Jackson, Lincoln, Wilson, the Roosevelts, Truman, Johnson, Reagan, Obama, or for that matter virtually every American President in one way or another, each had in shaping American society.

Leaders stand as living-breathing examples of the moral ideals that the people need to embrace in order for their society to succeed

Society's best leaders actually serve society as the very living symbol, even reality, of the moral order and its particular social design. These leaders are not political dictators forcing the people to adhere to strict social policy that they are imposing on society (though some will certainly try to lead this way).

Great leaders do not dictate. They inspire. They themselves become the visible idea, the very embodiment of the ideal features of that society – from the lofty goals or social ideals that the leader represents personally, to the choices to be made or the procedures to be followed which the leader inspires the society to embrace in order for it to be able to reach those lofty goals. This is what brings a society to success, even grand success (or tragically also, massive disaster if wrongly directed), because such leadership is not just accepted. It is followed enthusiastically by the rest of society.

Thus it is that truly "the man makes the office" – not the reverse. We have seen how the office of U.S. president changes in character and political effect as it changes hands, from one individual to the next. True, the office empowers an individual legally. But how (and if) that power is used depends entirely on the personal makeup of the individual holding that office.

This idea that the greatness (or failure) of any society is determined heavily by the personal character of the person acting as society's leader is illustrated very clearly in history.

Alexander the Great was no holder of any particular imperial office (though he was the son of the conquering Macedonian King Philip II), but the one himself who defined by his enormous activity what his huge empire was to become.

Hitler was brought to power as Germany's Chancellor in 1933. But what happened next to Germany had little to do with the mechanics of the German Weimar Republic or the office of Chancellor. In fact, that German constitutional order was quickly put aside by the German people themselves in order to build a German Third Reich or Empire around the very person of their FÃ¼hrer (Leader) Hitler. For better or worse (in this case horribly worse) the German nation redefined itself around the personality of a single individual. The same can also be said of Stalin's Russia and Mao's China. And we must add, this is exactly what is happening today under Xi Jinping's leadership in China and Putin's leadership in Russia.

With respect to America, in the break with King George III's royal rule in 1776 there really was at that point no precise social or political order presiding over or unifying the thirteen different colonies (now new states) as a whole, because the thirteen colonies had for so long simply and ably looked after themselves. But with rebellion against George III underway, these new states would have to find for themselves a higher path, one that could bring them together for success in this Herculean task. Thankfully, there were a number of old well-established social habits that they shared mutually, ones built on America's long-standing moral order, ones that allowed the Continental Congress to function (even though not yet officially approved by all the states).

But the ultimate dynamic that moved America forward from its status as a group of thirteen English colonies to the status of thirteen newly independent but united states was importantly found above even that. It was in America's actual leadership. And here is where George Washington looms large as the foundation on which the independence movement relied for its existence and its durability. As Washington stood firm and unbending before the huge challenge of breaking the determination of the British to force the American states back into submission, so also did these states find inspiration not to bend or yield.

Then not only did he lead the country through the dark days of the rebellion, Washington went on after that to shape greatly what the "United States" was to look like in the way he went at the role of serving as the republic's first president.

That's how social orders are put into place, and thrive (or not).

GOD'S HAND IN HUMAN HISTORY

We cannot emphasize enough the fact that those who had the greatest influence on society, on history itself, were not bureaucratic fonctionnaires,⁶ but instead dynamic individuals of great charismatic character, able to inspire others – many others – to follow them step by step as they led … even if the path they were taking the people down was highly dangerous. And the word charismatic is key here. Charisma is an old Greek word χάρισμα (khÃ¡risma) implying a special anointing, a heavenly or divine grace placed upon a person, such as makes that person unusually gifted as a leader. That divine grace as a gifting comes not from another person or social institution or material or physical property. It has long been understood as coming from above, above as in Heaven, the gods, or God himself (but possibly also Satan as well, if care is not taken in measuring or judging by ancient spiritual standards the voice of such a non-worldly or supernatural source).

The Chinese, for instance, have understood for thousands of years this phenomenon in the form of what they called since ancient times the Tianming (Mandate of Heaven). Chinese Emperors gained the necessary respect and support from the Chinese nation in being able to demonstrate the many ways that Heaven had smiled on their rule. Visible social success indicated clearly the approval and support of Heaven. But the downside of that same idea was that when floods, famines, diseases or enemy raiders attacked Chinese society, that same respect and support among the people would melt away. To the people this was a clear sign that the Tian (Heaven) had obviously withdrawn that special favor that Chinese society depended on so greatly. And this change in political climate would be the signal to Chinese warlords to put forth their candidacy as the new Emperor. And a violent round of civil war (often lasting centuries) would result, until it was clear that Heaven had once again made its choice: a victor, a Tianzi (Son of Heaven) would finally emerge to take charge of China.

But other examples abound. Alexander the Great believed that he was actually the son of a God (or at least that's how he presented himself to the society that supported him) and went to the Siwa Oasis in the middle of the Libyan Desert to have the Amonite priests there attest to this fact.

Likewise, David was anointed at a very early age by Samuel as God's chosen leader of Israel, and David was willing to wait through very troubled times, even passing up opportunities to launch his own career, as he waited for God (and only God) to bring his kingship into being.

So also the Roman imperial candidate Constantine was vitally aware of God's appointment of him as future Emperor, moving against a much larger enemy candidate under the sign God had given him to conquer with: the Chi-Rho sign of Jesus the Christ.

And closer to home, we know that both Washington and Lincoln were men of immense Christian faith, drawing on that faith to keep them moving forward during very dark times, when others would have quit.

Of course there have been rulers who have operated apart from just such a sense of divine appointment. But lacking such higher "legitimacy" they are driven to rule by force, often by sheer terror inflicted on a subject people – as paranoia and fear of losing their position (never really quite "legitimate" in the eyes of the people) drives them forward. Certainly Stalin and Mao fit this description. And the manner and ultimately durability of the societies that they ruled over attest to the problems that soon enough develop for a society when it lacks a "higher" hand supporting it.

To be sure, such a "higher hand" is historically defined in different ways, with different versions of Heaven, different versions of God. Or are they all that different? What we humans can understand about the Realm of God can come only through human interpretation, and thus is going to come to us through different cultural versions. But they all point to the same higher source of power, one existing above all human capability itself.

Christianity itself is built entirely on that understanding, not just through the life, death and Resurrection of Jesus but through the empowerment of the Holy Spirit (and in the case of the Apostle Paul, a post-resurrection encounter with Jesus himself), God's very hand in getting Jesus's early followers up and running as a powerful people.

One thing also is clear about these key historical examples: Heaven's call on them to the task of leadership was always quite real to the leaders themselves.

Others, such as intellectuals, who operate only from their self-conceived world of pure reason (thus needing no God beyond their own personal intelligence), will mock those who put forward the claim of divine calling. Why not? No such calling ever came to them – and never will come to them, as long as they put huge material boundaries around their personal sense of reality.

As the opening chapters of the Bible put things, such scoffers have chosen to do what Adam and Eve did in cutting themselves off from God and his counsel (and provision). They have eaten from the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil – so as to be themselves like God … as the Deceiver himself beguiled them into believing would be the grand result of this act of disobedience to God. Such individuals can scoff all they want. But they will never find the social significance that they so greatly crave in trying to be so reasonable.

Why is this connection with the higher power of Heaven or God thus so important to social leadership? Leaders are not your average person. Your average person naturally wants to fit in, be an integral part of society. There is absolutely nothing wrong with those instincts. A strong society depends on exactly that very instinct being found widely among its people.

But leaders (at whatever level of society, all the way from the White House, to moms and dads at the family dinner tables) – in any circumstance in which they assume the responsibilities of leadership – must answer to a different voice than that of the immediately approving world around them. Presidents and parents push ahead because they see in their respective world of great moral (and loving/caring) responsibility, whether to the many or the few under their care, something higher or more noble, something not yet attained, something that not even the society they are dealing with can yet see or understand. And by answering to that higher vision, that higher calling placed on their hearts, they do not pull back from a social responsibility simply because the society they are supervising (from little children to jealous rivals) does not see things their way – although it does become an accompanying responsibility to help those in their care to see and understand exactly what the leaders require of them.

Thus it is that true leaders (and not just those occupying high political office) are designed to draw others forward to a higher task, even when the society itself is afraid or confused … especially when it is afraid or confused. Leaders must lead the people to a higher call, a call that those under their care do not yet see or understand, yet one that is vital to the survival and growth of that society. Leaders must lead.

Lincoln

For instance, Lincoln was so brave as to actually undertake the crushing responsibility of breaking the intention of the Southern states to abandon and thus cripple the American Union. Presidents before him had seen the difficulty of trying to keep the Union together in the face of this horrible question of slavery, and had simply looked the other way, kicking the can of slavery down the road for someone else after them to deal with.

But Lincoln, in assuming the American Presidency, understood that the burden of leading the Union through this deadly challenge was his, by literally Divine appointment. And to God, and God alone, did he increasingly look for comfort and support as he put the nation through this terrible crisis – in order to finally get this matter settled once and for all.

Keeping people with him tested every ounce of Lincoln's personal strength as a leader. Yes, he had his supporters. Great leaders do. But he had also a huge number of whiners who complained about how all this killing of America's young men was way beyond the nation's ability to sustain. They were ready to quit, to let the South be on its way with its slaves and all, and leave what was left of America to get on with things as best it could. Even on his home front, with his wife, he faced the constant demand to "give it up" so that the Lincoln family could just get things back to normal. But "normal" was not an option for America, and Lincoln knew this. God himself had called America to greater things than just letting matters go. America, after all, was a covenant nation, commissioned by God to give hope to the world by setting before the world the living, breathing human example of how the little people of the world no longer needed to live in bondage to the powerful of this world. America had to live on as a light to the world showing the way to something we call true democracy.

As Lincoln himself put the matter at the memorial service for those tens of thousands of young men who had died in this horrible 3-day battle on the fields of Gettysburg, Pennsylvania:

It is rather for us to be here dedicated to the great task remaining before us – that from these honored dead we take increased devotion to that cause for which they gave the last full measure of devotion – that we here highly resolve that these dead shall not have died in vain – that this nation, under God, shall have a new birth of freedom – and that government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth.

It is little wonder that for generations after this speech in 1863, it and the opening lines of America's 1776 Declaration of Independence would be the most memorized words in American history. Lincoln, leading this nation, under God, was determined that this country would not quit in the face of the horrible sacrifice required of those answering the noble call that God himself had placed on the American nation.

And thus America answered its president's reminder of this high calling with a huge "yes! Yes, we will so commit ourselves and our sacred honor to this most noble, this Divine, cause."

That is what Divinely inspired leadership achieves. This is not what ordinary office-holders do. They simply follow plans and programs placed before them. Leaders however inspire others to take action, to take up the hard, even sacrificial, work together so that their society may move forward. It is after all, the effort of the masses of "little people," not the fancy ideas of bureaucratic social planners, that bring societies their grand successes.

God's call on very ordinary individuals

But the Puritans also realized that God's hand was just as available to those same ordinary individuals, doing the ordinary things that human life ultimately depends on. That was the whole point of the Puritan experiment in America. At a time when European kings were defending their positions against a rising middle class, the kings claiming special divine appointment, the Puritans answered back that the same God is just as much interested in and supportive of the "little people" – as clearly was Jesus in his time. They claimed that what God truly wanted to see come to pass was a people who lived and worked together in harmony as equals before God. And equals before God also meant equals before man. And thus the democracy concept was brought front and central in the Puritan experiment. It provided a powerful moral legacy for a new America, one that carried the nation forward for nearly four centuries.

In America, this social dynamic actually has always found its foundation in the American home. Family goals and social discipline – but ultimately the way the family looked above to God – developed repeatedly among the rising generations because of the moral-spiritual leadership the parents provided their children. Parents were/are the rising generation's first encounter with inspiring leadership. Children develop social instincts and social trust at a very early age, because of the leadership their parents provide.

From there, such social inspiration was/is cultivated further through inspiring classroom teachers and inspiring pastors. The high quality of the classroom, and the high quality of the pulpit, was always the key to American democratic success.

That social pattern must never be replaced by the domination, even dictatorship, of the "enlightened ones" found in bureaucratic office or seated behind high judicial benches – or even in front of TV cameras offering 24-hour wisdom or comments on how they believe life should take shape in America – willing to assume, even to take away, such local responsibility from the community's families, schools and churches or synagogues. In America, those in such high social position were long-expected to be there to inspire such grass roots development of the American family, school and church/synagogue – not replace it.

The Humanist challenge

History reveals again and again that substituting Humanist or Rationalist directives in place of Divine directives has consistently demonstrated what a disaster it could be to America, individually or corporately. Humanism as a religion has done nothing to improve moral or social conditions in America, but instead left them to be merely "whatever" Americans as individuals and groups have decided they would like them to be, for the moment and in this or that particular situation, always highly justified with the latest and loftiest of Reasons. But history makes it tragically clear that societies do not survive the effect of "whatever" ethics.

⁶French for those who govern from their chairs behind desks in governmental office buildings.

INSPIRING THE WORLD ... RATHER THAN TRYING TO FIX IT

It is important to bring back God's covenant with America, for America to get back to serving as "The Light of the World," giving hope to the little people of the world that their God of Heaven, the Creator and Judge of all that has and will happen on earth, wants to show them the path to greater glory, both for themselves, their families and the societies that surround them. America was supposed to exemplify that divine covenant – not force some version of a well-engineered program (engineered by clever human design) on the other tribes and nations of the world.

Looking back in history it is easy to see how America has performed much more effectively in simply acting to inspire and assist other nations – to the extent that these nations themselves have called for such assistance. Truman, taking his cues from his own deep Christian understanding of life and its dynamics was very circumspect in this regard and played the situation in post-war Western Europe masterfully (aid to Greece and Turkey, the Marshall Plan, relief to blockaded Berlin, and the creation of NATO). Kennedy's Peace Corps was set up along these same lines.

And yes, this means even assuming a political toughness at times, if it is done in cooperation with others seeking such assistance – such as was the case of Truman's decision to come to the aid of the South Koreans in warding off the aggression of the North Koreans. Bush Sr's action against Saddam in Kuwait was built on extensive international support – and most importantly the support of the Kuwaitis themselves – as were Clinton's actions in Yugoslavia against the ethnic cleansing going on there. In each case the goal was not to remake the societies along supposedly improved social lines, but simply to support the peace and prosperity of societies experiencing deep social trauma. Clinton had no desire to remake Serbia, only to back it out of its attacks on its neighboring societies.

Even here, caution and restraint – rather than moral crusading inspired by some plan to perform a makeover of some other society – has characterized America's finest moments. And when bringing peace and prosperity clearly seemed to be beyond America's powers to bring to a specific situation, wise American presidents stayed out of the chaos. Such was Clinton's decision not to save Rwanda from its self-inflicted genocide. This included Reagan's decision to pull out of Lebanon and Clinton's similar decision in Somalia when it became apparent that American involvement was not inspiring local support. And it included Bush, Sr.'s decision not to go charging into an Iraqi quagmire in an effort to take out Iraq's leader, Saddam Hussein. There were situations that properly called for American action; there were situations where no such calling was there for America. Wise American leaders knew the difference.

Disasters in trying to "free up" the world

Tragically, such wisdom has not always directed America's relations with the larger world. At the end of the 1800s America chose to involve itself in a rebellion of the Cubans against their Spanish lords, and not only took the sides of the rebels in Cuba but also spread that sense of involvement to the Spanish Philippines, where having helped bring down 300 years of Spanish rule there, Americans decided to put themselves in charge of further Philippine development. This then turned the Filipinos against the newly occupying American authorities. In short, America acted no more Liberal than the Spanish in the way they conducted themselves in the life of the Philippine nation.

Then there was soon after that Wilson's decision in 1917 that American boys should go off to Europe to kill German boys, to bring glorious democracy to the world by participating in "the war to end all wars." Only meaningless and deeply tragic death and destruction resulted for everyone involved in this senseless nationalist conflict.

Then there was Kennedy's decision to take down the heavy-handed regime of Diem in Vietnam in 1963, which threw the southern half of the country into political confusion. This was quickly followed up by Johnson's decision to send a few American soldiers to Vietnam to restore that country's broken sense of order – lest the Communist North Vietnam should take advantage of this American-caused situation in the southern half of the country. When that did not suffice to restore a pro-Western social order in South Vietnam, Johnson sent a few more troops, then a few more, until by the last year of his presidency in 1968, he had over a half-million American troops in Vietnam trying to make things go the way he thought they should.

The very exhausting Vietnam venture became a huge disaster for everyone involved, particularly when a Democratic Congress then in the early 1970s decided to undercut a Republican Nixon White House, which was wisely withdrawing American troops from this mess – while at the same time offering a small amount of, yet very vital, financial support to our South Vietnamese allies. Congress simply cut off all further support of the Vietnamese – even mere financial support – allowing the North Vietnamese to be easily able to fill the political vacuum our abrupt departure had created. This in turn left thousands of pro-American Vietnamese to be slaughtered by Soviet Russian-supported North Vietnamese troops who filled that vacuum. And the chaos caused by the collapsing political status quo did not end there, but spilled over even more horribly to the killing fields of neighboring Cambodia.

And Congress never understood, or at least never took responsibility for, the tragedy that mere political ambition at home brought on those dear people abroad.

And equally tragic, entry into the 21st century saw America apparently having learned nothing from the grand tragedy of Vietnam. The horribly failed Vietnam example did not stop Bush Jr. from attempting to "free up" Iraq the way Kennedy had once freed up South Vietnam. Thus Bush decided to "liberate" Iraq in bringing down Saddam Hussein's government in that country. Unsurprisingly – and most tragically, – Bush's massive military effort (Shock and Awe) did not lead to a Humanist's democratic utopia for that country but instead, horrible infighting.

And Bush's similar effort to undercut Afghanistan's Pashto tribesmen in their support of the Taliban did nothing but throw Afghanistan into ever-deeper chaos and violence.

And how exactly was our effort to undercut Syria's President Assad such a "humanitarian" venture? He was simply trying to hold a multi-ethnic country together in the face of Syria's fall into social disintegration. And the same held true for Gaddafi in Libya.

How would we have felt if France or Britain (or both) had decided that it was the "humanitarian" thing to do to undercut Lincoln in the same way we undercut Assad and Gaddafi, because Lincoln's effort to keep the Union together in one piece through military means was in violation of every precept that all Humanists find themselves living and dying for? Thank God (literally) that the leaders of France and Britain did not decide to "go Humanist" on us in the 1860s.

What is truly amazing is how it seems always the case that "going Humanist" (undercutting social authority) ends up with the necessity of having to "go Darwinian" (restoring order by the use of domineering means)!

Where is the wisdom in all this?

What does it take to hold a multi-ethnic, multi-sectarian, multi-class society (as all societies at some point tend to be) in a state of peace ... where the streets are safe, homes are secure, and the people able to enjoy the simple prosperity that makes for human happiness?

Christianity has always had a powerful answer to that question: let God direct, inspire, provide ... through similar actions that we sons and daughters of his do on his behalf. He has made very clear in the Bible's instructions as to how life itself is to be understood and addressed. The Bible is like a science textbook on social dynamics. We need to pay attention to what God himself has shown us there, as countless generations before us have done, most wisely.

And God, as always, will prove very faithful in his generous support of those who choose to live the Biblical way, at the same time in providing them with the means to be so generous and supportive of others.

Indeed, America was originally set up for just that purpose, namely, to illustrate as the City on a Hill, a Light to the Nations, how God wants all of us humans to live. And America has clearly succeeded marvelously when it went at things in this manner.

So why then are Humanism and Darwinism so set on bringing down the Christian worldview and the Christian constitutional foundations that have served both America itself and the surrounding world so well?

Somehow Humanism still feels the strong need to prove itself, against Christianity. And Darwinism is totally scornful of Christianity.

DEFENDING WESTERN / CHRISTIAN CIVILIZATION

The English political leader, but also the author of volumes of Western history, Winston Churchill, referred to Western Civilization as "Christian Civilization." And rightly so. The Christian worldview officially shaped the European (and later, American) Western world since the early 300s, over 1700 years ago (but beginning its influence well before even then). Christianity was central to the understanding of what society was all about, what its purpose was, and how life was to be moved forward to higher things. Until 50 years ago this same Christian understanding about life was also the mainstay of the American idea, giving the country three and a half centuries of national vision and social purpose during its development from a European backwater to its position at the head of the Christian world as its primary defender. Christianity was a central element in America's rise to its status as the world's sole Superpower.

Meanwhile, as a slow but gathering process occurring over the last half-century, all of that cultural-spiritual dynamic has been pushed aside step by step by federal judicial decree, in the effort to replace the Christian legacy with Secular Humanism. The results of that substitution both at home and abroad have been dramatically much less than excellent.

The 2019 Pew Report

On October 17, 2019, the Pew Research Center released a 26-page report which clearly demonstrated how badly that Christian character of America had declined – in just the last ten years alone. The Center had just completed a statistical analysis comparing changes occurring in America's Christian profile between the years 2009 and 2019, a time-period coinciding with the presidencies of Obama and Trump. The report was appropriately entitled "In U.S., Decline of Christianity Continues at Rapid Pace: An update on America's changing religious landscape."⁷ The title speaks for itself.

The study found that in 2019, only 65% of Americans still described themselves as Christians, down 12 percent over the previous ten years. At the same time, those that claimed no religious affiliation (from atheists to simply "nothing in particular") rose to 26% of the population, up from 17% in 2009 (page 3).

The age of the Americans being surveyed was even more skewed against Christianity. Of the oldest group, the Silents, the decline in Christian affiliation was only 2 percent; for the Boomers it was 6%; and Gen-X 8 percent. But the percentage drop among the Millennials (born in the 1981-1996 period) was a huge 16 percent (page 7). This left 84% of the older Silents still standing in 2019 as Christians – whereas only 49% of the Millennials still identified themselves as Christians (page 8). That is a terrible indicator as to where America is headed into the future morally and spiritually as a nation.

Not surprisingly also, political party affiliation made a big difference. For those that identified themselves politically as Republican, or leaned in that direction, the ten-year decline was 7 percent. But the Democrats marked a 17 percent decline in Christian identity (page 7). As a consequence, in 2019, 79 percent of the Republicans still identified themselves as Christians, whereas the figure stood at 55% for the Democrats (page 19). That is a very significant political difference, pointing further to the likely moral and spiritual direction in which the country is headed, depending upon which of the two political parties is in power in Washington.

Christianity and society

Christianity at its heart (as set forth by Jesus himself) was about Godly empowerment of the individual, in the face of life's many and often quite difficult challenges. Christianity supported human life with the understanding that with simple faith in God alone, these challenges could be met and conquered by even the least socially significant of individuals – because God himself offered his powerful support to those who simply trusted him as their Heavenly Father. God was not interested in a person's social status, as societies tend to do.

Christianity also demonstrated clearly (during the worst of times of Roman persecution) that individual strengthening through Divine empowerment also worked awesomely well in producing the right structuring for social as well as personal life. In fact, it was the witness of the Christians in their immense personal and social strength that impressed a morally decadent Rome to begin to look to Christianity as the solution to the decay that infected Roman life in every imaginable social area possible.

Admittedly, Christianity has been used as a civic formula for autocracy. But that was never its original nature. And from time to time reforms have swept the Christian world in order to bring the people back to the original character of the Christian faith. The Protestant Reformation of the 1500s and 1600s, during which English Puritanism was founded, was just such an early example – and a critical social foundation for New England and all it stood for. Also, the Great Awakenings were key to keeping Christianity on course in the face of the natural instinct of man to want to displace Divine guidance and support with personal autonomy: the ever-present temptation to want to play God himself.

The Decline of the Christian West

For the past 70 years, since the end of World War Two, Europe has looked to America to play the leading role in defending Western civilization – allowing Europeans to look after their own material development in the meantime. As they lost their leading position in world events, so also they lost interest in the moral-spiritual order that once had made Europe itself the center of global affairs. They were content to live to some kind of grand material, but not grand spiritual, purpose. This moral-spiritual decline, as philosophers ranging from Aristotle to Toynbee have observed, was an indication of Europe's overall political-social decline as well.

America's own self-imposed spiritual decline

But America too now finds itself headed down the same moral-spiritual road as Europe. Worse, many American leaders themselves have called on Americans to take a strong stand against the supposed tyranny of Middle America. These post-modern crusaders feel the need to attack a traditional America still possessing the strong and well-tested and well-proven social standards that for generations America has faithfully lived by. They treat not only such social tradition but even patriotism itself as some kind of disease. Instead, these "progressive" crusaders even consider those who stand publicly against the symbols of American patriotism as the nation's true heroes.

But what do they actually stand for? We know what they stand against. They have made it quite clear that their highest call is to "shame" America, for being whatever it has, over the centuries, become. But a society cannot survive simply on the basis of its people being against its very existence. Where is the unifying idea that will pull America together, and Western civilization with it? Who today is offering strong moral guidance to our great Western or Christian civilization?

In all of this, America seems to be asleep at the wheel, its leading political voices in Washington more intent in playing the game of crippling each other, as if Washington politics were merely a TV game show for wannabe celebrities. True moral leadership all around the political table seems to be in short supply.

The critical need for another "Great Awakening"

We have arrived at the same point in which if our civilization is to be saved from its own self-inflicted folly, we are going to need another Divine intervention. Or else the days of American global leadership, as well as the modern Western or Christian Civilization's social-moral-spiritual leadership in the world's development, are over.

China can hardly wait for this to happen!

⁷https://www.pewforum.org/2019/10/17/in-u-s-decline-of-christianity
-continues-at-rapid-pace/

THE CALL TO RENEW THE COVENANT WITH GOD IN JESUS CHRIST

So … at this point it is of critical importance that America finds its way back to the original Covenant with God, similar to the one presented by Moses as the Hebrews were about to enter the Promised Land, and exactly the same one that Winthrop referred to in delivering his famous sermon, "City on a Hill," as the Puritans were about to depart in their ships in order to begin their great Christian experiment in America:

. . . Thus stands the cause between God and us. We are entered into covenant with Him for this work. We have taken out a commission.

. . . if we shall neglect the observation of these articles, [and] embrace this present world and prosecute our carnal intentions, seeking great things for ourselves and our posterity, the Lord will surely break out in wrath against us, and be revenged of such a people, and make us know the price of the breach of such a covenant.

. . . Now the only way to avoid this shipwreck [of God's wrath], and to provide for our posterity, is to follow the counsel of Micah, to do justly, to love mercy, to walk humbly with our God. For this end, we must be knit together, in this work, as one man. We must entertain each other in brotherly affection. We must be willing to abridge ourselves of our superfluities, for the supply of others' necessities. We must delight in each other; make others' conditions our own; rejoice together, mourn together, labor and suffer together, always having before our eyes our commission and community in the work, as members of the same body.

. . . Beloved, there is now set before us life and death, good and evil, in that we are commanded this day to love the Lord our God, and to love one another, to walk in his ways and to keep his Commandments and his ordinance and his laws, and the articles of our Covenant with Him, that we may live and be multiplied, and that the Lord our God may bless us in the land whither we go to possess it.

But if our hearts shall turn away, so that we will not obey, but shall be seduced, and worship other Gods, our pleasure and profits, and serve them; it is propounded unto us this day, we shall surely perish out of the good land whither we pass over this vast sea to possess it.

Therefore let us choose life, that we and our seed may live, by obeying His voice and cleaving to Him, for He is our life and our prosperity.

Maranatha ("may our Lord come")

We are way beyond the possibility of human self-help. As a fully-confused and wandering Fourth-Generation people, our help at this point can come only from the intervention of God. And so we pray that God might come and free us from our self-inflicted folly.

But we might also add: "However, dear Lord, please do not make it hurt too much." The Great Depression of the 1930s cured us of our 1920s silliness. The toughness required of human life during the Depression got America smart real fast, and prepared the country for the enormous task of fighting both the German and the Japanese Empires at the same time. Thankfully God had intervened in order to toughen up America, or a still-silly America would have failed horribly to meet successfully the challenge of a war placed before it in 1941.

But today we have over a half-century of silliness to get over, not just ten years, as was the case following the Roaring Twenties. Thus it might take much more "toughening up" of our character than even another ten-year Great Depression to get us back to being a First-Generation people, a people once again able to take on the huge challenges that await us. We are saddled with an enormous national debt and a Secular-Socialist moral-spiritual dependency we have fallen under at home, and we face the amazing inability to focus on, or even understand, much less answer, the monumental challenges to America rising abroad.

But we are hoping that God will honor the Covenant that our ancestors once signed onto, for themselves and for the future generations to come after them. That is our fondest hope. It is, in fact, our only hope.

Maranatha!

Miles H. Hodges

30. THE LESSONS OF HISTORY

Miles H. Hodges